Tolerance cannot be measured in terms of degrees of intolerance. I am essentially opposed to burning books even when they incite others to violence. But freedom is either an absolute or it is conditioned on not inciting others to violence. Anything else is rationalized bigotry.

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Friday, March 29, 2013

Peace in our Time

There are people who believe that
an apology for the deaths of nine people on the Mavi Marmara, in 2010 is
completely undeserved.

This appears to have been proven
correct, when following the apology by Prime Minister Netanyahu, President
Erdogan told Turkish reporters “It was too early to talk about dropping the
Mavi Marmara case against the Israeli soldiers, and that normalising diplomatic
relations would come gradually.” (FrontPage magazine.com)

President Morsi of Egypt has
uttered some horrific statements of religious bigotry. This isn’t, as some
would hope, a kind of religious mania, or even insanity – when society as a
whole displays behaviour we view as being aberrant it is not they who
are viewed as misguided, but we, those of us who are 'out of step' with the consensus.Egypt is a country
where female rape is becoming a national sport; sanctioned by the state to
control its females. “A study by the Egyptian Centre for Women's Rights said
that 62% of men admitted to harassing women, while 53% blame women for ‘bringing
it on.’ Nor is this phenomenon limited to Egyptian women: while 83% of Egyptian
women have experienced sexual harassment, so have 98% of foreign female
visitors.”(Middle East
Forum) Egypt
gave the world the Muslim Brotherhood, the institution that has spread across
the globe as a cross between the Institution of the Inquisition and the Knights
Templar.It is noteworthy that in a
country without Jews to blame, they blame Christianity for the failure of the
Arab Spring.

President Erdogan has been known
to defend Jews against Turkish jingoism and xenophobia but he is also a
demagogue and ultimately his loyalty is firstly towards his faith and second to
his nation. His veneer of civilisation is a pragmatic response to how he
perceives other countries will react to his behaviour.In 2012 he used chemical weapons (as reported
in the German Press but no where else at the time), against the Kurds.His one fear is for the failure of his
Islamist revolution; ethical considerations are entirely absent from his
behaviour.Statements made by Erdogan, his
Foreign Minister, Ahmet Davutoglu and President Morsi of Egypt reflects the written word of
primitive societies, bestial worshippers of chaos and war. These are all
rational, highly intelligent men so their carefully chosen words of incitement
mark them out as sinister figures whose corrupted souls are steeped in the
stagnant and foul smelling prejudice of the dark ages of history. The danger is
that with 7th Century attitude they posses 21st Century
weapons.

Neither Egypt nor Turkey are societies that are
entirely dedicated to obscurantism and bigotry but neither Egyptian
Fundamentalism nor Turkish neo-Ottoman imperialism are political ideologies
that are tolerant of diversity. The West cannot ignore nor trust either. If
containment contributed to the fall of Communism then we must question why we
have not actively encouraged the containment of Turkey
and Egypt (and Iran.)

There is a psychology of
confidence that Islam and especially Arab society engenders that we must not
ignore.Even if we do not understand the
cultural antipathy that both of them holds towards us (and the Occident), we
cannot ever ignore their consequent contemptuous hope concerning our ultimate
demise, in particular, when it manifests as openly expressed derision.

Sticks and stones will break your
bones but with words begin the slaughter.

Most of the Near-East was created
by Britain and France after
the First World War. The San Remo Conference in 1920 created a legal basis for
carving up the defunct Ottoman empire into
artificial states. Those states were always dysfunctional and could only ever
be ruled by force of arms and dictatorship.It is possible that what we are now living through is the unravelling of
the artificial mess that Europe created.The dismemberment of the Arab world may be
the only hope the world has, for peace.

A nation starts the way it
intends to continue. It is important that we remember this.

Societies are formed over
centuries, not decades and certainly, not over electoral cycles.America’s Constitution is 225 years
old.It may have taken almost that
long for true equality to exist, perhaps it remains a work in progress.There will be many people who by denying that
it exists mean to undermine it. Nevertheless without the visionary founding
fathers, the Civil War of the 19th Century and the Civil Rights
Movement of the 20th Century may not have had a moral basis.

Zionism has an equally idealised
foundation.Zionism created The
Declaration of Independence which forms the inspiration behind Israel’s Basic
laws.It is worthwhile to repeat part
of that founding Declaration:

“The
State of Israel will ….be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by
the prophets of Israel;
it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its
inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of
religion, conscience, language, education and culture…”

A nation begins as it intends to
continue.Israel has suffered 65 years
of warfare, 65 years has it been threatened with annihilation and yes it
remains militarily, the most powerful nation state in the Near-East.But the military threat remains and it has
created, by necessity, a militant nation which must continuously remain
vigilant against the threats to democracy and civil liberties that a militant
society will encourage as a by-product of its survival in a hostile
environment.

It is something that has skewered
Israeli political as well as moral thinking. In Israel full equality exists in law
but not in practice, just as it does not exist in practice in any other country.There exists full integration in most facets
of Israeli life with one exception – and that is religious communities of all
faiths.All the faith communities remain
segregated and they choose to remain so – it is Israel's greatest challenge and its
most difficult battle yet to be fought – It remains the most significantimpediment toIsraeli tolerance within national life.

The barriers that exist are equally
entrenched throughout all the religious communities in displaying universal opposition
to religious assimilation.

One of the biggest barriers is
that Judaism has no outgoing contemporary experience of proselytising.Non-Jewish minorities in Israel have aggressive and long established missionary
activities and if they are not now engaged in such activities it is because delegitimisation
is another form of denial that works to undermine the essential equality of Israel’s
majority Jewish population.Prejudice
keeps disparate religious communities apart as each safeguard's its own
theological or ideological position and is a wholly negative response that is
intended to prevent people from seeking ways to live alongside of each other, peacefully;
to integrate or even to assimilate a new national identity.

European and Arab (Mizrahi) Jews
have a greater than 50 per cent rate of intermarriage, but Arab and Jew?This must be the area of greatest attention
in the 21st Century.

Egypt
and Turkey
lead traditional, racist societies.Any
tolerance they feign has been historically dependent on a strictly enforced
Islamic hierarchy and an institutionalised hierarchic inferiority imposed on
their minority populations.It is not
that their societies have become more bigoted.Severe economic problems combined with well organised, inherently
violent religious groups (the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafists) have
contributed towards a consequent lack of physical security.These were already weak and dysfunctional
societies.

Morsi and Erdogan both proudly
display their racism and their ethnic hatred as essential elements of their
national identities. No excuse, diplomatically delivered, can provide a defence
for the original sin of Turkish and Egyptian national endeavours.

Prime Minister Netanyahu would be
wise to remember this point when he negotiates with one of our existential
enemies.